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<h3><a name="SECTION0025266000000000000000"></a><a name="doctest-OutputChecker"></a>
<br>
23.2.6.6 OutputChecker objects
</h3>

<p>
<dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline">
  <td><nobr><b><span class="typelabel">class</span>&nbsp;<tt id='l2h-4984' xml:id='l2h-4984' class="class">OutputChecker</tt></b>(</nobr></td>
  <td><var></var>)</td></tr></table></dt>
<dd>
    A class used to check the whether the actual output from a doctest
    example matches the expected output.  <tt class="class">OutputChecker</tt>
    defines two methods: <tt class="method">check_output</tt>, which compares a given
    pair of outputs, and returns true if they match; and
    <tt class="method">output_difference</tt>, which returns a string describing the
    differences between two outputs.
    
<span class="versionnote">New in version 2.4.</span>

</dl>

<p>
<tt class="class">OutputChecker</tt> defines the following methods:

<p>
<dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline">
  <td><nobr><b><tt id='l2h-4985' xml:id='l2h-4985' class="method">check_output</tt></b>(</nobr></td>
  <td><var>want, got, optionflags</var>)</td></tr></table></dt>
<dd>
    Return <code>True</code> iff the actual output from an example
    (<var>got</var>) matches the expected output (<var>want</var>).  These
    strings are always considered to match if they are identical; but
    depending on what option flags the test runner is using, several
    non-exact match types are also possible.  See
    section&nbsp;<a href="doctest-options.html#doctest-options">23.2.3</a> for more information about option
    flags.
</dl>

<p>
<dl><dt><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr valign="baseline">
  <td><nobr><b><tt id='l2h-4986' xml:id='l2h-4986' class="method">output_difference</tt></b>(</nobr></td>
  <td><var>example, got, optionflags</var>)</td></tr></table></dt>
<dd>
    Return a string describing the differences between the expected
    output for a given example (<var>example</var>) and the actual output
    (<var>got</var>).  <var>optionflags</var> is the set of option flags used to
    compare <var>want</var> and <var>got</var>.
</dl>

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